Bringing back throttling and cooldowns plus failure to communicate is only making the hole deeper.

Bringing back throttling and cooldowns plus failure to communicate is only making the hole deeper.

Destiny 2 is in a hole right now, and Bungie can’t seem to get it out because the studio keeps digging. The dust-up this week over Faction Rallies is just the latest example in a long string of unforced errors that have disappointed PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC gamers.

The first error this week was not communicating changes to how Faction Rallies will reward new seasonal weapons. Amidst the commotion of trying to communicate the Destiny 2 roadmap for the next nine months, Game Director Christopher Barrett admits the studio simply forgot to inform players that the new weapons won’t drop from Faction Engrams this Faction Rallies and only the winning weapon of the first faction rally in the next and so on.

A lack of communication from Bungie has been a giant issue with Destiny 2 players and even Destiny 1 veterans. What Destiny 1 veteran can forget the time Bungie changed the Crucible matchmaking parameters, denied they had changed it, and then finally admitted to the changes?

Barrett has been doing yeoman’s work communicating with the fans since his Live team took over maintaining Destiny 2 following the PC release. However, all the previous miscommunication from Bungie only magnifies every new one.

Bungie/Activsion

Bungie also continues to merrily dig by throttling Faction Tokens from Lost Sectors after being blasted by Destiny 2 players following the discovery of an XP cooldown many months ago. The studio added a cooldown to Lost Sector chests after the last even where an exploit was discovered in The Weep that allowed the chest to reset its contents but not the enemies when players exited through a set of doors and returned.

The original patch notes suggested the cooldown/throttle was going to be just on an individual Lost Sector basis. Instead, this bafflingly applies to all Lost Sectors, which Barrett has not admitted is too penalizing. The game director says the cooldown timer won’t be fixed until the next patch, but this ignores the fact Bungie should just fix the individual exploit in The Weep and adjust Token Rewards appropriately to encourage players not to solely farm Lost Sectors during Faction Rally events.

I previously argued Destiny 2’s issues derive from design decisions during the transition away from the original game to the sequel. Instead of building on what worked and fixing those areas where Destiny 1 fell short, Bungie stripped out much of what made the game fun and unique in pursuit of a more casual audience. The roadmap appears to address some of the issues Destiny 2 has, but Bungie needs to stop repeating the same mistakes. It needs to stop digging.